“OF COURSE NOT TURKISH PLASTIC, BUT THE TURKISH PLASTICS SECTOR”
Promotion is the Only Way to Open the Global Market to Small Businesses, which Constitute 99% of Our Sector and Account for 80% of Our Exports!
Within the framework of foreign trade legislation; established on May 17, 2016, under the leadership of Istanbul Chemicals and Chemical Products Exporters' Association (İKMİB) with the approval of the Turkish Exporters Assembly (TİM) and the Ministry of Economy, with the aim of moving the Turkish plastics sector towards high value-added products and increasing its exports; the existence of the “Plastics Sector Promotion Group,” for which we, as the Plastics Industrialists Federation (PLASFED), also provided significant support for its establishment, and with which we collaborated to promote our plastics industry to the world, is a necessary formation and a great opportunity for our sector.
We believe that opposing this structure, which many sectors struggled greatly to establish but failed, yet which we as a sector succeeded in creating and managing, and conducting lobbying activities for its closure, is a clear attack against our sector, especially against the competitiveness and development of our small businesses.
Promotion Groups are structures established by exporter associations, whose budgets and activities are strictly controlled by TİM and the Ministry of Economy. Their purpose is to support sectors' R&D, branding, image improvement, perception management, and promotion activities. The Plastics Promotion Group was established with this purpose, with the support of even those who oppose it today, but it is the only promotion group that has been subjected to severe attacks before its budget was even approved and before it even had the opportunity to carry out any activities. This is unfortunately a disgrace for the plastics sector, as it was supported silently during its establishment, but later its closure was demanded with inexplicable behavior.
This has unfortunately had a highly negative impact on how our sector is viewed, especially by İKMİB, as well as by TİM and the Ministry of Economy. Our sector's image of strength and unity has suffered a difficult-to-heal wound.
Launching such severe attacks on a structure officially established on May 17, 2016, making statements inconsistent with reality such as “Let the Plastics Promotion Group be closed, and this sector will rise to first place in Europe,” making prophecies about an increase in dues to be deducted from exports, attempting to distort and trivialize the meaning with remarks like “there can be a hazelnut promotion group, but can there be plastics promotion? Can there be Turkish Plastic, German plastic?” and rejecting the “marketing function,” which has begun to be accepted as a scientific discipline, is an approach that lags considerably behind the current level of the business world and contemporary understanding. Especially when the reality is that other sectoral promotion groups have provided export increases of over 200% to their sectors in their respective fields.
We know that a deduction of 25 Dollars from 1 container at average prices, or 500 Dollars from our 1 Million Dollar export, will not ruin us today. However, if we fail to take steps to strengthen our position against developing plastics countries, especially those in the Middle East with proximity to raw material sources and cheap input advantages, and if we continue to export at low figures in terms of quantity and value, even from China, which we constantly declare as a “great threat” on every occasion, our future as a sector will remain in jeopardy.
We know that if the costs of the sector were the primary reason for opposing the Plastics Promotion Group, then fairs, which impose very serious burdens on the sector due to being held annually, would be addressed first, and their costs reviewed. If the owners of this short-sighted effort, who have today become an importers' club, acted with sincerity and an awareness of sectoral benefit, they would not place large advertisements in newspapers calling for the closure of the Plastics Promotion Group with the fair income they earned; instead, they would use their resources to further develop and advance this structure.
And again, we know that the majority of our sector consists of small businesses. While these small businesses account for 80% of exports, they benefit the least from government incentives. Our small businesses struggle to allocate budgets for promotion and marketing. Promotion Groups are most beneficial for the future of our small businesses, and we consider it appropriate to always stand by what is right and by the weak.
To those who think the plastics sector is merely a club of the rich and elites, we say, you are greatly mistaken! Those who take the cream of the sector and declare everything else a lie, those who say “Me, me, me,” you are not on the right path. We are the voice of modest businesses, the defenders of their rights; we are the voice of over 6,000 businesses whose names may be small but whose struggles for existence are great, and we are the advocates and fighters for this just cause until the end. We know that the anonymous exporters and businesses of the sector, numbering in the thousands, who are small but whose struggles for existence are great, know and appreciate the difference between us and those who said yes yesterday but change direction with the wind today.
As the Plastics Industrialists Federation, drawing its strength from SME plastics manufacturers spread across the country who experience the difficulties of manufacturing and the anxieties of the future every day, we support the formation of the Plastics Promotion Group, believing that with the savings we make today, we can secure our future and solidify our place in increasingly challenging markets through proper promotion starting today.
Sincerely,
Selçuk AKSOY
Chairman of the Board
This content has been translated using artificial intelligence technology.